Voices that Inspire

What inspires you from WFSU public media? Here's this week's Voices That Inspire. I'm Marjorie Turnbull and I am retired and involved in various things in the community. I did serve on the County Commission for two terms and then went on to the legislature for three terms. I never thought of myself as a woman legislator or a woman commissioner. I felt of myself as a legislator or a commission who happened to be a woman. It really is a result I think of my father's influence while I don't think I know that as a young girl, he made me believe that I could do anything and that being a girl was not a barrier to anything. And he encouraged me and praised me when I did things. So that had a lot to do with just building confidence that it wasn't because I was a woman that something happened, that I couldn't get a bill through or someone didn't follow through on something that I was urging. It was because I would say to myself, what could you have done differently? How could you have couched this in terms that would have sold the idea better? It would be my hope that by being the first woman to be elected to the legislature from Leon County, it would encourage other women. I've always been an optimist and sometimes I've been accused of being a polyanna but I've always felt like if you assume the good in people, that's what you're gonna find. And the same is true. If you assume a good outcome, you can then be involved in working towards that. I've always been hesitant to assign motives to other people because you can misjudge someone's motives. So try to figure out why they're saying what they're saying or why they're doing what they're doing in order to accomplish goals. I'm Marjorie Turnbull. You're listening to voices that inspire.